The Book of This and That — Themes and Context

A Beast with a Thousand Eyes

The opening essay, “Suspicion,” establishes Lynd’s characteristic method: a single concept is anatomized through simile, anecdote, and moral grading. He calls suspicion a “leering perversion” of the passion for truth, and distinguishes the explorer’s leap into light from the politician’s grubbing after evidence. The prose is conversational but precise, building a case through accumulation. Later essays, such as “On Cheerful Readers” and “Stupidity,” employ similar tactics—taking a human trait and turning it over to reveal its contradictions. Lynd’s voice is that of a skeptical moralist who distrusts easy pieties, whether about progress or about human nature itself.

The Famine and the Table of Values

In “The Heart of Mr Galsworthy,” Lynd shifts from general reflection to pointed political argument. He takes issue with John Galsworthy’s prioritization of animal welfare over constitutional reform, using the Irish Famine as a counterexample. Lynd notes that during the Famine, Ireland exported grain and cattle worth seventeen million pounds a year while people starved—a disaster he argues was preventable by self-government. He insists that constitutional changes like Home Rule and abolition of the Lords’ veto are not distractions from social reform but enablers of it. The essay reveals Lynd’s commitment to concrete historical evidence and his willingness to challenge a fellow writer’s “table of values.”

Spring Fashions and Savage Survivals

A lighter note appears in “Spring Fashions,” where Lynd observes that women’s return to dress as a festival of spring shows “a remnant of primitive humanity surviving.” He predicts women will soon be “the only savage” left. This essay, like others on dancing, black cats, and hoaxes, demonstrates Lynd’s range: he can move from the grim arithmetic of famine to an amused appreciation of human foibles. The collection’s structure—essays on murder, coincidences, indignation, and the Futurists—suggests a mind that finds equal interest in the absurd and the serious, and that trusts the reader to follow these shifts without explicit signposting.

Lynd’s essays reward readers who enjoy following a single argument through its twists and counterexamples. He does not offer systematic philosophy but a series of provocations, each grounded in specific texts or events. The collection’s title is apt: it is a book of this and that, held together by a consistent, skeptical intelligence. Readers may find it useful to read the essays in order, as themes and references echo across them, but each stands alone as a self-contained piece of early twentieth-century commentary.

Reading Lynd’s musings on suspicion reminded me of an autumn afternoon, sitting with my grandfather as he quietly judged a neighbor’s kindness. We never spoke of it, just watched the leaves. Essays in Idleness — Reading Companion held the same unhurried warmth, a gentle permission to simply think without conclusion, like two old friends sharing silence over tea.